


Magical

by quicksparrows



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, First Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:27:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21576004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quicksparrows/pseuds/quicksparrows
Summary: “I just had a question.”“Oh no,” she said. “Is the story bad?”“No no,” Sylvain said. “It’s great. I was just wondering... have you ever been kissed?”[Illustrated]
Relationships: Sylvain Jose Gautier/Bernadetta von Varley
Comments: 46
Kudos: 950





	Magical

**Author's Note:**

> Twitter user Ohthatlook posted [a really cute exchange between Sylvain and Bernie](https://twitter.com/ohthatlook/status/1199365932914806784?s=20) so I asked if I could do a fic based off it, aaaand that is where we are now!
> 
> Edit: now there's art by [Emmy](https://Twitter.com/chickenbabby)

Sylvain was not sure that he had ever seen Bernadetta’s bottom properly touch a chair.

Every time they convened in her room for a workshopping session, she sat this way and that — her legs tucked up under her like a chicken, her legs slung over the armrests, sometimes even crouched on the seat like a gargoyle. He never commented. He figured it would be strange to start now after so many meetings, but it still crossed his mind from time to time. It did so just then, as he glanced up from the sheaf of papers in his hand. She sat at her desk, back to him, hunched over with her nose mere inches from the page. Her pen moved frantically, as if her hand struggled to keep up with her imagination.

Sylvain felt a smile tug at his mouth and then he put his feet up on the frame of her bed, settling a little lower in his hard chair. He went back to reading. He was about twenty pages deep into a story about prolonged, agonized longing for a very charming nobleman, and it made for a nice break from the dry, analytical history he usually liked. He supposed it was easy reading, too, because it made life sound so simple. No matter how unrealistic it got, it was nice to think about — he had never personally known any nobleman to be charming, after all.

“Hey Bernie?”

She kept writing.

“Bernie.”

“What?” she responded, and then she turned. She looked nervous, but that was nothing new. Her gaze dropped to the manuscript, and how many pages she had left. “Ooh... if you can’t read it all tonight that’s fine, but _please_ don’t take it with you... last time...”

(He’d been banned from taking her scripts away to read later because last time he’d accidentally turned it in to Byleth with his private study essay. Embarrassing for everyone involved, really, himself included.)

“I wasn’t going to,” he said. “I just had a question.”

“Oh no,” she said. “Is the story bad?”

“No no,” Sylvain said. “It’s great. I was just wondering... have you ever been kissed?”

Bernadetta turned in her seat so slowly that he had a long time to contemplate how absurd the question was. Of course Bernadetta had not kissed anyone. It had taken her several months to allow him into her room, and he still had never been properly within a foot of her personal bubble. How had anyone kissed her?

She just stared at him, expressionless but red as a tomato.

"What?" she breathed.

Sylvain sat up properly. That was confirmation enough, in his eyes, but he just had to appreciate how flustered it made her. He might as well have just hit on her.

"Ahh," he replied, grinning. He raised the sheaf of papers. "No judgement, I swear. I just thought... the way you describe it, it sounds pretty magical."

There was a question in her wide eyes, but she swallowed down her mortification and put it to words: "Is it wrong? Is it not like that?"

"Not really," Sylvain said. "Don't get me wrong. It's really nice. I just thought... it sounds like you really want to."

"What makes you think of this kind of stuff?" Bernadetta demanded, a little waver in her voice. She reached for the manuscript but Sylvain held it just out of her reach, laughing and tipping his chair on its back legs despite already having ample arm length on her.

"It's just that you describe it here," Sylvain said, gesturing, and then he flipped through a few pages, "and then here again, and then here again... and here! It's like these two can't keep their hands off each other."

Bernadetta flushed even hotter red.

"Sylvain," she moaned. "Please! Will you stop making fun of me if I admit it?"

"I'm not making fun," Sylvain insisted.

"You are! Is it really so bad?" she pleaded. "I mean..."

She trailed. Sylvain let his laughter die off, and he watched her deflate a little, still crouched on her seat. She folded her arms against the backrest and buried the lower half of her face against them, her shaggy haircut hiding the rest. Sylvain let his chair tip forward again, and he held the manuscript within her reach.

"Hey," he said. "Honestly, Bernie. I think it's really cute."

She lifted her head just enough to fix those big, timid eyes on him. Out with it, he wanted to tell her, but he'd pushed her buttons quite enough for one moment. He offered her the manuscript back but she didn't take it, and for a moment they sat in relative silence.

"It's just that... _no one_ would want to kiss Bernie," she admitted, finally, casting her gaze down.

Fuck, she was cute.

"That's not true," Sylvain said. "Sylvain wants to kiss Bernie."

She stared. Sylvain thought he'd maybe crossed a line, but he wasn't quite sure where it was. Did she think he was just hitting on her for the sake of it, or did it creep her out? She trembled like a rabbit caught in a snare, and he thought he should at least offer her an out.

"Call it writing research if you want," Sylvain offered. If it was a terrible experience, at least she could call it method writing.

"Um," she said. "Sure."

Sylvain felt rather surprised, despite having a relatively good track record with those kinds of lines. He was going to kiss her, then. She sat there watching him, and her heart must have been hammering fiercely because the whole of her trembled. Sylvain pushed himself to his feet and took two steps over to her chair, and he put a hand on its back, just over her shoulder. He gestured with a nod of his head.

"Sit," he said. "Properly."

"Why?" she asked.

"Trust me."

Bernadetta didn't take her eyes off of him even when she turned in the seat to sit, properly. She sat like she was about to be scolded, her knees together and her hands clutching the sides of the seat, but the colour was fading from her face. Her bottom lip trembled. Sylvain leaned over her; he was very much taller than her, especially sitting, but she surprisingly didn't shrink away.

"Does my breath smell bad?" Bernadetta asked, nervously.

Sylvain shook his head, and he kept one hand on the back of the chair and brought the other just under her chin. He ran his thumb across her lower lip and she took a sharp breath in, and then he dipped her and the chair backwards. Bernadetta squealed quietly, and he caught it in his mouth as he leant right in and pressed his lips to hers.

He felt her freeze and then tremble and relax, and he lingered for a moment. The longer he lingered, the more she relaxed, and by time he backed off a little, the bridge of his nose running along hers, her hands weren't wound quite so tightly around the seat. They were off entirely, in fact. They were fisted in the front of her own uniform, against her chest. Sylvain chuckled, just off his breath, lips barely off hers. She opened her eyes and then she _smiled._

It was about the chastest thing he'd ever done, and yet he was surprised to be intrigued by it, too -- it was soft, and it was nice, and it was...

Well, it was a little magical.


End file.
